As Easy as Murder

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘My nephew,’ I replied, as modestly as I could.

  ‘Who?’ he retorted. ‘The caddie? Bloody hell, love, your suntan’s fading if you’re his auntie.’ He turned to his mate, seated just beyond him. ‘D’you hear that, Nev?’ he chortled. ‘This lady’s the black fella’s auntie.’

  A few other spectators looked around, at both of us. I sized him up. If I’d chosen, I could have kicked him solidly in the head before he’d even got one cheek of his ample arse off his seat. But that would have been a hell of a start to Jonny’s round. More than that, it’s not the way that disputes are handled in Spain. Still, I wasn’t for letting the porky yob go unanswered.

  Happily, neither was Clive, the practice ground manager, my Scots friend from Monday. While I was debating whether to poke the guy in the eye metaphorically or literally, he stepped over three rows of seats and plonked himself down, next to loudmouth. I couldn’t hear what he said, but it worked. Tubby and Nev weren’t inclined to have a bit of fun at his expense. They were out of there, without even a backward glance in my direction.

  ‘Sorry about that,’ Clive murmured as he made his way back to ground level. ‘Bloody yobs from Benidorm; I can tell the kind a mile off. If they give you any more bother let me know and I’ll have them banned from the course.’

  ‘I’m more worried about them upsetting my nephew’s caddie,’ I confessed. ‘Or deciding to heckle him and Jonny on the way round.’

  ‘They won’t go near them; be sure of that. I made it very clear to them that they shouldn’t. Don’t you worry,’ he said. ‘I’m looking out for young Mr Sinclair. I promised that I would.’

  That puzzled me. ‘Who did you promise?’

  ‘His manager. Mr Donnelly. He called me, told me that he had a lad coming on tour and asked me if I’d make sure he got settled in all right.’

  ‘You know him?’

  The big Scot nodded. ‘Aye, from way back. I played a couple of seasons on the PGA tour in my time. Brush was around then, on the edges of things, like. Crazy man, for all that he was a college graduate; all the Yanks are now, nearly all even in our day. The game’s elitist over there; don’t let anyone tell you different. He never amounted to anything on the tour. Plain truth, he just wasn’t good enough, even without the drink. He lost his playing card, then dropped out of sight for a while, for a right few years, in fact. I’d heard he resurfaced . . . he got religion, so they say, but I was still surprised when I found out he’s looking after your nephew. I’m doing him an injustice, maybe. Like I said, he was a bright enough guy, when he was sober and didn’t have a golf club in his hand. Looking at the endorsements your lad’s got, he’s doing a pretty fair job for him; now it’s up to Jonny to show whether he’s good enough to wear all those badges.’

  He had a gallery of seven when he hit his first shot as a tournament professional, at twenty minutes past two that afternoon. Shirley, Patterson, me and four others; like us, they were adherents of the other two players, one French, the other a Swede.

  I know he was nervous, for he told me so afterwards. It couldn’t have helped when one of his partners hooked his tee shot into the trees on the left, but it didn’t affect him, as he hit a conservative three metal right into the middle of the fairway, short of the threatening bunker on the right.

  I was standing well out of his eyeline but close enough to hear Uche tell him, ‘Shot, boss. You can’t win the tournament on the first tee, but it is possible to lose it.’ It was the right thing to say; it calmed me down too, for in truth my heart had been hammering so loud that I’d been worried he’d hear it.

  We set out after the group, following the cart path to the left of the fairway. The Stadium Course, as they call it, was built as a championship venue, and so the spectator vantage points were good, allowing us to get close enough but not too close. Jonny was away, furthest from the green after his cautious drive, but the perfect distance for his eight iron. They’d put the flag in the most difficult position, back left of the green, six paces on and near a bunker. Jonny’s second shot landed just short of the target and rolled a little closer. A ten-foot putt later and he had his first birdie on the card.

  The eleventh hole, his second, looked very scary indeed from the tee; it was less than two hundred yards long, a par three, but with a big bunker in front, and a water hazard the size of Lake Geneva at the back. The green was so small that I could hardly see it from where I stood, but my nephew must have had a good view for he nailed a six iron that would have hit the bull if he’d been aiming at a dartboard rather than a thirty-yard circle of grass. Two putts, and he’d made his first pro par.

  The next was a par five on the card, but Jonny played it like a four. He whacked his drive further than I could see, close enough to find the green with a four iron, while his two partners each chose to play short. His putt was the best part of thirty feet and I knew that he was concentrating on leaving it close, but his line was good and he got lucky. He’d played his first three holes in nine shots, three under par. Shirley went as crazy as I felt; anyone else might have been embarrassed, but not her. My nephew didn’t seem to notice her whoops; that’s how far he was ‘in the zone’.

  The thirteenth was a beast, a par four of modest length but made difficult by a green that was mostly surrounded by water. The safe approach was to the left and that’s where he played, putting his first four on his card.

  By the time we reached the eighteenth, where he saved par after leaving his second shot in a bunker, he was five under. I looked up at the leader board behind the grandstand. The Irish kid was in the lead; he’d shot a sixty-five, seven under, one ahead of our Spanish pal with the ponytail and two ahead of Jonny and three others, all of them finished for the day and back in the clubhouse.

  We had a little more company for the second nine. Word had got around and more spectators, English ex-pats in the main, came to join the party. So did a couple of journalists and a portly guy from a British TV station, microphone in hand, who seemed to be in hiding under a wide-brimmed Aussie hat. Nerves began to grip me again. They must have shown, for Uche saw me, smiled and gave me a large wink.

  The second nine was tougher than the first had been. Jonny made his first mistake at the third, a par five, where there was no margin for error. He went for the green with his second, but tugged it slightly left. The ball took a hard bounce, into the water. The crowd groaned, and I felt like crying. He cheered me up with his next shot, his fourth after a penalty drop, a delicate chip that rolled up to the hole-side, seemed to pause as if to size up the drop, then fell in.

  He played it ultra-safe after that, with his caddie’s help, for I saw a few debates over club selection and guessed that Uche was urging caution where there was any doubt. Jonny played steady par golf from then on and was rewarded on the ninth, his last, when his long uphill putt made it all the way to the hole. He was seven under par: tied for the lead.

  The first thing I did, as soon as he’d stepped off the green, was hug him. ‘Extra big steak for you tonight, my boy,’ I promised.

  ‘Not too big, please, Auntie P,’ he replied, with a smile. ‘I have to talk to the press, so I’ll be late getting back, and I don’t want to be so full that I can’t sleep.’

  ‘Whatever you like. You’re a star, now.’ Just like your uncle was. The thought jumped into my brain but stayed unsaid. As well, for Jonny contradicted me.

  ‘No, I’m not. I’m the first round co-leader and I’m surrounded by guys who are as good as me and who’ve been here many times before. I won’t be a star for another three days.’ He beamed, and gave me another hug. ‘And then, I promise, we will have a party!’

  The second thing I did, as he headed for the recorder’s tent, to check, sign and register his score, was to call his mother, to give her the good news. It wasn’t necessary. Ellie had been watching the coverage on the portly guy’s TV station, and then keeping in touch with his score online when its live transmission had ended. She sounded a mess; elated, sure, but desperatel
y sorry not to have been there. ‘How is he?’ she asked. ‘Is he handling it okay?’

  ‘He’s as laid-back as his granddad,’ I assured her. ‘He’s got loads of stuff to do here yet, but I’ll tell Uche to make sure he calls you as soon as he’s done.’

  ‘He’d better not need bloody Uche to tell him,’ she snorted, a welcome flash of the old Ellie. ‘How’s the Black Prince getting on anyway? That’s what Harvey and I call him,’ she added, as if explanation was needed.

  ‘He’s going fine. They’re a good partnership.’

  ‘That’s what we thought. I’m glad it’s working out. You know, I’ve got to say: the manager, the sponsors, the caddie . . . everything’s almost too good to be true.’

  Eight

  I understood what Ellie had said, but it all made sense next morning, when I logged on to the main UK media websites, and found Jonny all over them. ‘Tragic movie idol’s nephew is new star on tour’, was the headline on the Telegraph report, and a fair summary of all the other coverage.

  One of two British writers had noted the connection in their advance pieces about the event, but they’d all been too cautious, or cynical, to go overboard on it. However, with a score on the board, everything had changed and for a day at least, he was the big headline. There was video footage as well, on the European Tour website, from the after-round briefing in the media tent. There wasn’t much, but Jonny handled himself well, particularly when he was asked how his late uncle would have felt about his performance. ‘He’d be trying to buy the movie rights,’ he replied, with only the faintest smile.

  My first instinct was that I’d like to have punched the questioner’s lights out. Jonny was his own man and what he’d achieved had nothing to do with Oz. But then I thought of those endorsements and the fact that their relationship had been a help to his far distant manager in securing them. If the sponsors, or the tour publicists, had put it into the public domain, that was probably fair enough.

  I didn’t have a chance to discuss it with Jonny. Our alarms had been set for five thirty, and he had left for the course just after six, so that he could fit in a full practice session before his tee time, a more civilised nine forty. I’d decided that I wasn’t going to go that day. ‘Why not?’ he asked, when I told him as he worked his way through breakfast, a mound of scrambled eggs on toast. (Tom was still sound asleep upstairs, so I’d delayed mine.)

  ‘You’ll have plenty of followers as the co-leader. I can’t be there every day you’re playing. Besides,’ I added, ‘you don’t need me. You’re so focused. You didn’t look at me once yesterday and you didn’t even hear Shirley screaming when you had that eagle. If I did go, you wouldn’t even know I was there.’

  ‘Maybe not, but Uche would. For all he’s smooth, the guy’s more African than you’d think. He’s dead superstitious; you’re his good luck charm, so he said after the round. If he doesn’t see you he’ll worry, and he might get his yardages wrong, give me a three metal instead of a three iron. You’re a vital part of the team, Auntie P. Come on.’ He paused. ‘But hold on, I’m being selfish. I’m forgetting about Tom. He can’t have packed lunches every day.’

  ‘He’d be quite happy with that,’ I assured him, ‘and he would today, regardless. There’s a class trip this morning, to the ruins at Ullastret; they’re doing Iberian history.’

  ‘Well . . .’

  ‘Can I bring the dog?’ I asked, mischievously. His face fell, but I didn’t let it hit the ground. ‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘Kidding. Charlie’ll be okay. Ben Simmers will pick him up if I ask him, and keep him with his two.’ Ben’s dogs and Charlie are from the same stable; they’re family too.

  I was easily persuaded in the end. Actually I’d been dead keen to go, but felt that I might be intruding. But if I was that important to the Black Prince, I could hardly refuse.

  In the end, I was glad I’d let myself be persuaded. When I showed up on the first tee, the first people I saw were Patterson and Shirley. She’d found some tartan in her wardrobe and was dressed up like a bloody cheerleader. As I’d suspected, there was a proper gallery, up to a hundred people, but she was front and centre. Jonny had eyes for nothing but the fairway when he appeared, but Uche clocked her straight away. The look that he threw her suggested that if I was his good luck charm, then Shirl was a voodoo doll. Then he saw me, and brightened up.

  Jonny started the way he’d finished the day before, with a steady straight drive, and once his partners, neither of whom had come close to breaking par in the first round, had played, we set off after them. ‘Out of sight, and lip zipped,’ I warned Shirley.

  I’d thought that most of those who’d watched the start would have stayed in the stand, but I was wrong; they followed us around, as did a few journos, and a small contingent of photographers and radio correspondents. Television Man joined us too, at the sixth, keen to pick up on the story.

  By that time Jonny was one under for his round, with two birdies and one bogey, a shot dropped after a pushed tee shot at the fourth finished close to a tree. ‘No worries,’ I heard Uche say as they left the green. ‘You were bound to lose your cherry some time, and we’re still on top of the leader board.’

  That hadn’t occurred to me, but he was, as I confirmed when I saw a board behind the fifth green. The Irish kid and the other early pacemakers were all out later in the day, and so, at eight under, Jonny was on top of the pile.

  It got better over the next thirteen holes; four more birdies and one more dropped shot, after contributing another ball to the collection in the lake at the formidable thirteenth, and Jonny finished with a sixty-eight, eleven under for the tournament, and two clear of the ginger ponytail, who had reached the eighth by that time.

  I’d managed to get rid of Shirley at the turn by telling her that she looked like one half of Fran and Anna, and that if she didn’t want to figure in any embarrassing television clips on YouTube she’d be as well to lose the tartan or get out of sight. Since the former would have shown the world her underwear, she opted for a tactical withdrawal, using ‘an early lunch, before it gets busy’ as a tactical excuse.

  I was waiting beside the last green once again as Jonny and Uche walked off. He took off his sunglasses, tipped back his logo-ed cap, lifted me up with those golfer-strong arms, gave me a great big hug and whispered, ‘Glad you came, Auntie. Uche never put a foot wrong.’

  I kissed him on the cheek and whispered back, ‘Good for him. Now put me down; we’re on telly.’

  We were too; as I found out a few minutes later, his mother was watching the Sky coverage, along with a few million others. They included a couple of journalists at the scene. As Jonny and his caddie headed for the recorder’s tent, one of them sidled . . . no other word could describe it; she approached me like a snake, side on . . . up to me.

  She looked to be around thirty, blonde, dressed in loud golfer gear, red trousers and a yellow Ashworth shirt, and with make-up that was incongruously heavy, given where we were. She had a microphone in her hand, and she was smiling, but not with her eyes. They gave a different message; to me it read, ‘Watch out.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ she began, in the sort of honey-soaked voice that answers the phone sometimes when you’ve called someone who wants to make you feel at home before they screw as much money out of you as they can.

  I stared at her, and as I did I was aware of someone moving in on my right, a guy with a telly camera on his shoulder. ‘Yes?’ I replied.

  ‘I’m Christy Mann,’ she said, ‘from Spotlight Television.’ Her accent was Irish, I noticed.

  I frowned. ‘What the hell is Spotlight Television?’

  ‘It’s an independent station,’ she volunteered. ‘It broadcasts on the internet, and it supplies news footage to other stations.’ Then she moved in a little closer, held the mike higher and got straight to the point. ‘Can you tell me how delighted you are that Jonathan’s leading his first event?’

  I’ve heard questions asked in that form by broadcast journal
ists for as long as I’ve been shaving my armpits, and it’s always struck me as lazy, or stupid, or both. My frown became a glare. ‘How many degrees of delight are there?’ I asked.

  She giggled, then moved to Plan B; put words in the interviewee’s mouth. ‘Yes, you’re over the moon. It’s only natural that you would be, as Jonathan’s Significant Other.’

  ‘His what?’ I bellowed. ‘I’m his insignificant auntie, you idiot!’ As I shouted, I caught a glimpse behind her of a tartan-clad figure, rocking on her heels with her hands over her mouth and her eyes full of tears. ‘Have you been talking to that clown over there?’ I challenged.

  The reporter went all tight-lipped and serious on me. ‘I’m afraid I can’t discuss my sources, Miss . . .’

  ‘Mrs,’ I snarled, oblivious by then to the camera and its red light. ‘Mrs Blackstone.’

  She might have appeared to be a good imitation of an idiot, but she’d read her press coverage and she knew her two times table. A little light switched itself on in her deadpan eyes. ‘Mrs Blackstone . . . and you’re Jonathan’s aunt. So that means you’re Oz Blackstone’s widow.’

  I was where I didn’t want to be. ‘No it bloody doesn’t,’ I snapped. ‘Oz and I divorced years ago.’

  ‘But still,’ she schmoozed on, ‘you’ll have a unique insight into Jonathan, and his motivation. They say he’s the next big thing on tour. Do you know where he’s living this week? With you?’

  ‘That’s none of your business.’

  ‘But surely it is; he’s a public figure.’

  I went from annoyed to angry. ‘He’s a twenty-two-year-old kid starting out in a very competitive business. Look, if you’re so interested in him, why are you wasting your time talking to me? Why aren’t you in the media tent with the rest of the press, talking to the man himself?’

  For the first time, she backed off a little. ‘We’re not accredited for the tent,’ she confessed. ‘That’s not what we do.’